an ode to our golden years
by lady lutka
Summary: they crash and burn so loudly the sun and all the stars would envy them. —natsu&lucy. semi modernAU. an ode to the finale of FT. stay strong my sweets. *may contain minor spoilers*


this is in celebration of the final chapter of Fairy Tail.

it has been a crazy eleven years filled with laughter and chaos, and I am so damn glad I had all of you by my side through this.

this is completely unedited and i'm honestly crying rn, let's get this underway xx

/

 **Keaton Henson / _You_**

* * *

 _they crash and burn so loud the sun would envy them_

.

.

.

Sherbet kisses while they're still small, scuffing unlaced sneakers and by night, dreaming of doing it all over again. Catching fireflies, tumbling down grassy hills, speaking in tongues. He plays the dragon and declares her his queen—princesses are for sissies.

Summer fades and autumn falls, winter draws them home. They're a little wiser—no more putting toy dragons in the fireplace to see them roar. She prefers this weather, is determined to make him love it just as much as she does. There's baking, movie nights, secret sleepovers. Hot cocoa grins, marshmallow fingers. Parents flutter around and make fools of themselves on Christmas Eve; they sneak away to the backyard of her modest home and spend the night playing innocent games, where he is the dragon and she the damsel in distress—the damsel that lays plasters upon his sores and catches his hand whenever he falls.

Primary school is a whirlwind of glitter and turkey sandwiches, meeting new friends and ditching them to play on their own instead. They find a kitten one day on the walk home, and he adopts it. Her mother is allergic, her father too strict. Happy stays with her on Mondays and Thursdays, the days her father is most likely to be away. What her mother doesn't know can't hurt her.

Junior high brings shadows and cold. First his father, then her mother, both in the same week. A car crash, the truth so hurtful they can no longer look at each other without eyes stinging and breath hitching. The seasons turn over and fade. She is overridden with guilt, he no longer understands.

Summer brings them together again, and they dance under sprinklers and watch the endless summer sky. She still apologises, he forgets to listen. Why should they bear the brunt of fate?

"I don't believe in that bullshit," he declares loudly for all to hear, winces against the elbow digging into his ribs. _Language, Natsu!_

Junior high ends with a flourish: she trips over her his chair leg and sends the spiked punch in his hand flying. He pulls her from the overcrowded hall with barely contained laughs and they spend the night under the stars behind the bleachers, hands clasped and eyes glossed.

That winter they spend Christmas together; her father is away on business and she hates being alone for too long. His older brother burns the turkey but she manages to save the pudding. The three of them watch old home movies with glasses of extra boozy eggnog under the watchful eye of Zeref, and the following morning she flips pancakes and scrambles eggs, plants a kiss on the cheeks of her two favourite boys. Natsu goes pink, Zeref turns red and mumbles under his breath.

New Year's she steels herself and aims for his lips. It's sweet, innocent, light; all things tentative and chaste. The rest of winter they spend by each other's sides, bundled in sweats and fleece blankets. She reads fairy tales to him, and together they twist the endings so that every princess goes off with the fiend's son on crazy adventures.

High school is the worst and the best. She cuts her hair at ear-length, regrets it and then wears ridiculously long extensions. He will forever drag his fingers through it and tickle the back of her neck, which he will later ink with the silhouette of a thorny rose during spring break.

"I've never met anyone so obsessed with Beauty and the Beast."

"You're deliberately digging the needle in."

"Maybe."

"You're the worst."

"You love it."

"Maybe."

Her father flips when he sees it, drags both of her boys into the living room and yells obscene things like _he's a bad influence_ , _you're too young_ , and _I won't have it_. His concerns are ignored, as she deliberately commissions another tattoo from Natsu the next week. This one is large and mostly hidden, her mother's ultimate blessing following her spine in a sprawling script: _Guided by my heritage of a love of beauty and a respect for strength — in search of my mother's garden, I found my own._

She cries getting it and cries ever more when she spies the roses and wisteria he weaved between the scripture. They are a tangle of limbs thereafter, clumsy hands needy and nervous. At seventeen, she becomes a woman with her best friend, the boy of her dreams.

When he gets his license they are constantly on the road, stereo playing college pop radio and grins ever present. She feels so grown up in his car, hand atop his as he shifts gears. Going sixty on the PCH that hand will find its place on her thigh, just resting at the hem of her skirt and teasing the tassles there. Nothing brash—just tender, sweet and airy. They share strawberry shakes in tacky diners, he licks the cream off her nose like some savage; the bed of his pickup is transformed into something cosy and homely. Many nights are spent under the city lights, tracing inked skin and laying warm kisses on flushed throats.

Summer taints them with more death.

Mere months from senior year, her father passes in the soulless bed of a luxury hotel. The stars' fires fade, planets no longer filling the gaze of the girl born of stardust and moonflower. She shatters and dispels the myth that golden girls don't tarnish; splinters, the birdcage of her ribs creaking ever more with each heaving breath.

"Lucy," he whispers, cradles her closer to his rumbling chest. "Tell me what to do to make it better."

"Take me somewhere warm."

 _._

 _if you must mourn, my love_

 _mourn with the moon and the stars up above_

 _._

And so begins another adventure, crazy and unplanned and not entirely what she had in mind. Natsu had, of course, perceived _warmth_ as _loving_ and _home_ —but she prefers his definition to her own. They go to Italy, east to Croatia, north to Germany and further still to Norway where the Aurora awaits them. It is there, wrapped up in wool and braided blankets and looking up into his stubbly, wonder-struck face that she feels that missing piece slot back into place. She presses closer, entangles pink-tipped fingers in his sakura tresses, pulls him in for a kiss more explosive and colourful than the lights above them.

"I love you."

Lips quivering, teeth chattering, too warm and filled with light to give a damn. He blinks owlishly, grin falling into a dumb smile. "Wha?"

"I am in love with you."

Now he cradles her cheek, traces a warm hand across her rose quartz lips. "Luce, you sure?"

A roll of her eyes, richer than all the cocoa they had drunk as mere children. "Honestly, Natsu."

"Well I mean, it hasn't been an easy couple of months… I don't want you saying something you might regret."

She tips her head forward, presses their foreheads together. "I've always loved you. I always will. That will never change; God, I loved you even when we were five, covered in mud and you were eating my mother's flowers."

"That never happened."

"Tell that to the garden, I'm sure it will have a different opinion."

He quietens her with a kiss, and then she is a quivering mess beneath his weight. They tangle like vines, consume like a forest fire. They laugh themselves silly when he makes a stupid _Hellboy_ reference in response to her whispered cherishes: _I can promise you two things: One, I'll always look this good, and two I'll never give up on you._

"I want to stay here forever," she whispers later in the evening, nose pink-tipped and fingers frost-bitten.

He hums, splays a hand over her ribs to feel the heart beating there like a drum in the grey. They leave behind hotel rooms that will forever echo their tender love, return home to find all their friends in college living off ramen and cheap booze. Natsu learns he is to become an uncle, and the wedding between Zeref and the expectant Mavis is an event filled with daisies and new beginnings. Swaying in her Maid of Honour dress with Natsu in his tuxedo feels much like what she would imagine the flight to heaven to be like aboard Hercules' heavenly chariot. Mozart plays from the quartet comprised of close friends, and she loses herself in Natsu and the resin motes fluttering in the air.

"This feels right," he murmurs into her tousled locks, steals a bud from her fashionable flower crown by the skin of his teeth.

"It feels crazy," she adds. "I feel like it was only yesterday when Zeref introduced us to Mavis."

"I mean, it kinda was. We sorta left them all for a year without attempting to stay in contact…"

A playful nip to his throat. "Details."

"Marry me."

"What?"

He pulls them to a halt, wraps firm hands around her shoulders and rubs soothing circles into them. "We both knew it was going to happen. So let's do it, right now."

Her cheeks ache with her _rose-dipped_ grin. "Are you serious?"

"Of course I freaking am. I love you, Luce. Let's make it official. I want the world to know."

She doesn't hesitate. "Okay."

"Yes?"

"Yes, you dummy!"

"Holy shit!" he barks a surprised laugh like he had somehow expected her to refuse, lifts her by the waist and twirls her like they are on board a wayward carousel. "For a second there I thought you'd say no."

A tender kiss, softer than all the others before it. "As if I ever could."

"So we're getting married now?"

"I would highly recommend we hold off. I don't feel game enough to hijack the wedding of a hormonal and joyous pregnant woman."

"Right. Smart. Wouldn't have thought of that myself."

"That's why you have me, duh."

They plan a wedding, and at the persistent demands of their friends, they are wed not a month later, mere weeks after Mavis brought her son into the world. Pre-wedding preparations threaten her sanity, and as always they blaze a path through tradition. Not only does he see her in her dress, but they share a room because she doesn't trust him alone with his friends, given his short temper and childish antics—but she loves him for it, who else would bring her back to reality by going on a spontaneous trip around the world?

He doesn't hide his tears as she walks down the aisle, perched on the arm of his best man and her most loyal protector, second only to Natsu.

"You hurt her, I break your face."

Her love rolls his eyes. "As if."

Gray's face begins to pinch, and she has to elbow him not so subtly. "Please not now. Can't this wait 'til the reception?"

Her boys share a smirk as if the display had been entirely orchestrated to liven the otherwise tedious ceremony. They had already made those promises to each other thousands of times, were the church bells and organs really necessary?

"When I was young and dumb," —someone jeers _you still are!_ — "I thought loving someone meant crawling through their window to make sure the baddies wouldn't. 'Cause like, who the hell would try that while I was there? Plus, I missed Happy and the bastard ignored me yelling at him from the opposite window."

"The neighbourhood couldn't," she adds, smiles lovingly at the memories.

"And then when I got older, I was told that loving someone meant sacrificing all your sweatshirts. We'd already been doing that one for years though, so I ignored it. And then," his eyes sparkle playfully, and she is lost within them and their secrets, "I figured it out. That, loving someone isn't just putting them before yourself. It's about feeling at home with them. Like, just seeing them puts a smile on your face, and you get that feeling like you're coming home after a long, cold day."

"Lucy, I feel that every day with you. Even if we're arguing, or when you're sad, you will always be home. I don't need nothing in this life except you."

Stinging eyes, his name a sigh from her burning throat. The rest of the ceremony passes like sand between her fingers, and her lips form the words _I do_ and then they are kissing, cradling each other once again like they are children covered in mud and pixie dust.

When she says _I love you_ , he grins and brings their foreheads together, murmurs his cheeky reply into her ear.

"Who could resist me?"

The church roars when she clips him behind the ear. They make the ride to the reception in his pickup, _Just Married_ was written in his chicken scratch across the back window. Getting married at nineteen makes the hotel staff baulk, but for them, it feels right. Why should they wait for another half-decade when the oaths they agreed to were already in practice since they were five?

Little Larcade coos at the fairy lights his mother and aunty strung up, chubby little arms trying to grab at them. Seeing this, Zeref lifts his son into his own arms and up, up, up. The wedding photographer snaps what Lucy believes to be the best photo of the goddamn century.

When speeches begin it is with an air of despair. She prays Gray won't say something to offend her husband because a food fight would ruin her gown and she would rather not drag her sodden veil to the dry cleaner.

"So," Zeref begins, cheeks a little flushed from all the wine and beer. "I knew, as soon as we moved next door to Lucy, that Natsu was smitten. Why? Because he didn't unpack a single box, or help dad take his belongings upstairs, or even come to dinner—I wish Igneel could be here to see his idiot son get married. He spent the entire day running around Lucy's backyard pretending to be a dragon."

"Now fast forward a few years. I'm home from University, they're, what, seven? Eight? Anyway, I catch him sneaking out his window at two in the morning because 'he thought he saw some creep in Lucy's room'. That _creep_ turned out to be Lucy getting to sleep after staying up reading, but try telling that to Natsu without waking up the whole street. So I let him go do his macho thing, and had I known this would basically give him the green light to sneak out for the next ten years—" he pauses then, catches their eyes and lifts his glass high—"I would still let him."

"Lucy, you and Mavis are the best things to happen to the Dragneel family in a long time, and I hope my little brother doesn't scare you off. We all know he is a handful."

Zeref is forced to sit down by a scowling Natsu, and Lucy grabs her brother-in-law's hand and squeezes it with all her strength. The hall is too noisy for her to speak, so she settles with mouthing the words _Thank you_ , and, _I love you, too_.

The rest of the night passes in a blur of flushed cheeks and easy grins. Perhaps keeping the bar on tab was a bad idea, keeping it open the whole night much worse. They are too tipsy to do anything but sleep in their underwear that night, and when she wakes up the room is bright and pulsing.

"Luce," Natsu whines. "Turn down outside, it's too loud."

"You mean shut the window?" she giggles, gets up to do so. He snags her by the band of her panties as she sashays past, pulls her back into his embrace.

"Forget it, I don't mind."

She rolls her eyes but catches a few more hours of slumber, wakes to the scent of coffee and bacon.

"Room service," Natsu wiggles his brows and pours her the fresh brew.

That night is hot and heady, eyes laden and lips swelling in tandem. He smells of musk and the hotel back in Norway, she of vanilla and the hearths they left behind in Croatia. They make love and they make amends, create oaths and swear them in. It's everything she could have ever wanted.

"I bought us an apartment," she decides to tell him then, rather than keep it a surprise.

His head tilts down to meet her gaze, and he is every bit as bewildered as she expected. "What?"

"It's more of an investment property because I didn't like the idea of letting dad's money just sit. He wasn't that type of man, you know? I felt it was fitting that we use it to invest."

He blows out a breath, pulls her closer to his damp chest. "Well, yeah. Good thinking, Luce."

"Sorry to surprise you, I know you had your eye on that plot of land. But, if it's any consolation, I bought that, too."

Now he explodes, and she holds back a grin. "What?!"

"It's a legal requirement that we stay in the apartment for at least a year before putting it up for lease. I figured that we could use that year to build on your land so that hopefully, we're ready to move in once the legal stuff times out."

Those twelve months pass in a whirlwind of early mornings and warm nights. They cook every evening to cut costs—building a house, however modest and humble, is still a rather large drain from the account she had hoped to save for any rainy days. She doesn't mind though, and Natsu pays their bills with the wage he partly earns from teaching children to box and competing in the district championship. His work won't begin until early noon, and he will kiss her sloppily with a teasing grin each time their cheap cuckoo clock chimes the twelfth hour.

Now she paces their home, tension stringing a headache at the back of her neck. It's not the house, nor is it him. She loves those both with every fibre of her being—it's the flutter in her stomach that has her drawn thin.

There is no need for a little pink plus sign to know that she carries their child, and she is terrified. Not because Natsu wouldn't accept it, gods no. All he's ever been is a dorky dad, and the role model he enjoyed having until he was thirteen taught him the patience and love her own father could never quite grip.

The fear eats at her until he comes home, and when that door swings open she pastes on a smile.

"Babe, you wouldn't believe it! Romeo almost got me today!"

"Really? That's impressive, you must be proud!"

He cradles her cheeks, eyes big and bright. His scent soothes like an unction upon her very soul, and her smile is no longer false. "He earned himself my old gloves. Reckon Gramps is gonna enrol him for junior league—he's got something, y'know?"

A stroke to his warm chest, a chaste kiss despite the ballads their sheets sing. "Your dinner is warming in the oven. Are left overs okay for you?"

"Yeah, I'm hella tired. Thanks, babe."

She decides to forget about the fluttering until she can find the courage to tell him. So she uses distraction and procrastination—the walls are painted, the living room properly furnished, rugs laid and outstanding bills paid. The décor is kept cosy and warm, bright colours not needing any reflection. They already make the perfect pair, with her wardrobe and his hair. Most of their belongings come from IKEA, and she isn't ashamed in the slightest. At least her home is authentic Scandinavian—Natsu has learned to stop bringing up the 'made in China' labels.

But, even an idiot would notice their wife's third missed menstruation.

"You okay?" he asks one night when they are barely clothed and heavy-lidded.

She shifts beneath his hold, the wool from their rug raising goosebumps along her back. "Yes, why?"

"It's just, usually your periods are pretty bad and you haven't said anything about them in a while."

Panic causes her tongue to sharpen, a trait from her father she longs to discard. "Are you saying I complain about my period? Really, Natsu?"

He rolls them over so they are sitting, backs against their lonely armchair. "No, of course not! It's just—you would tell me if you went on the pill, right?"

"It's my body. I can do what I want, Natsu. You're not my keeper just because we're married."

She hates her tone, hates his recoil, is ashamed of her own irrational fear.

"Geez, Luce. I'm not trying to attack you or anything, the hell is going on?"

Her tongue wants to lash like a switchblade, but she holds it, refuses to meet his eye. Warm fingers, calloused tips collecting the stray tears beading on her thick lashes. He murmurs sweet nothings, calls her _baby_ and _shit, Luce, you're scaring me_.

The shame gnaws and it gnaws, at her heart and the life in her belly. She utters the words so quietly, the wraiths yanking at the branches outside come to a halt:

"I'm pregnant."

Pregnant, with child, with his child, their child. The life they created and the life she is so afraid of. Strange, how something no bigger than her thumb could tear her apart.

He hasn't said anything, but the arms rocking her against his chest have stalled. Finally, he barks a laugh, nothing conceited or cruel.

"I'm gonna be a dad?!"

"Yes."

"Yosh!"

And then they are swirling around the room like Swan Lake went awry, his boisterous laughs filling the whole house and drawing Happy to them. He's carried away with the celebrations too, cradled to her chest by the scruff of his neck.

"Holy shit! How long?"

She still feels on edge, terrified of their uncertain future. "Three months, perhaps a little more I suppose."

Natsu stills, looks at her like she's crazy. "What, you haven't been tested?!"

Now she scowls, squeezes Happy until he whines. "Have I had any time?"

"We're going tomorrow then!"

 _._

 _if you must wait_

 _do it right here in my arms as i shake_

 _if you must weep_

 _do it right here in my bed as i sleep_

 _._

There are blood tests and urine samples, frowning doctors and pill bottle labels. Complications. Miscarriage. They are all the same to her, and she can't remember ever feeling so numb. If only. What if.

"I'm so sorry," she will cry into her hands, refusing to meet his dull eyes. "I should've said something sooner, or at least taken the tests sooner. I'm so sorry."

But those words are empty, and when the blood comes she can barely rise from bed. Wordlessly, he starts the shower and carries her to the bathroom, helps her unclasp her bra and tug off her panties. She refuses to look at the cotton, curls up on the shower floor and sobs into her knees instead.

Once again she proves that golden girls tarnish, the rust spreading from her emptying womb to the rest of her.

"Luce," he finally says, voice raspy and tired. "Don't worry about that now. Just—just focus on yourself, okay?" _and then_

"What can I do?" _and then_

"Tell me what to do, please."

Bloodied knees, feeble pleas. "Just come here."

They stay like that until the water runs cold, her back tight against his chest. Skin to skin, breaths mingling as the water turns from ruby to pink, rouge to rose and then clear. The doctors warn that she will bleed for weeks, _would you like a counsellor_ , there's not much else we can do, _we are sorry for your loss_.

Family come and family go, seasons turn over until their front yard is smothered in snow. This time there is no Skopje or Minsk, Munich or Reykjavik. It is just them and a dusty coffee table and a bathroom haunted by the child they lost.

But life goes on, and they forget as much they can. At twenty-one, he is gifted with world lightweight champion and they go to Oslo to celebrate. First class flights, cheap wine. Swanky hotel, picking from sparse grape vines.

This time she tells him straight away when she's three weeks late, and they rush to the doctors like bats escaping hell. Congratulations. _It's still a little too early to celebrate, though, given your history_. She takes her pills three times a day, switches her diet to legumes, fish and grain. At five months pregnant, they tell the world through a corny photo shoot and are then persuaded to retake them, though this time there are flower crowns and fjords.

Contractions hurt, labour is worse. He begs her to take the shot, she tells him to shut the hell up. At four in the afternoon on a chilly November day, they welcome little Layla into the world. The three of them make the perfect family, and the photos and skin-to-skin bonding that follow become part of her top five sweetest things in life.

They are patient parents, with tonnes of love to give. The pitter-patter of tiny footsteps bring a smile to her face every morning and being round again with their son warrants breakfast in bed made by her clumsy husband and intelligent little one.

"Mama! Look, Pa spilt syrup all over himself!"

"Oi, I'm saving it for later!"

"How silly of him! Did he make a big mess for mama?"

"Yeah! There's flour everywhere. Maybe we should call Aunty Mira next time, Pa."

"What was that?!"

But their family come nonetheless at all hours, bearing gifts and trays of lasagne and meatloaf. _Three plus one equals fun_ , her friends say. _You're fucked, man_ , his friends say. _Pray to god the kid isn't a mini him._

And they are right. Layla's birth was bliss compared to Iggy's, which had her screaming for hours on end. At two weeks old he is already his father's son with his roughness. Breast feeding is almost not an option with the pain of his bite, and she can only imagine the fate of her breasts when his teeth start coming in. So she takes to expressing instead, and the juggling act of a fussy Iggy, inquisitive Layla and Natsu's wild and roaring love ears her a weekend away from it all with her best friend.

"Ig's almost on solids. He'll be fine, Luce. Mira has formula just in case anyway."

"But we never left Layla, how do we know he'll be okay?"

Natsu raises a brow and gestures at their son's moon eyes and Mira's giggles. "He'll be _fine_."

It takes several minutes before she willingly leaves, kissing her children and pushing Natsu away when he fusses over her luggage. He takes them to a small town on the Irish coast and to a cabin, stowed away in the woods. The Airbnb meets all of her expectations and then some.

Natsu says something dorky as he trails fire across her skin. _I'm in the business of baby-making and tonight is my busiest night_. The cabin barely contains their light—stars quiver and fall, trees whisper amongst themselves about the two golden lovers and all their sweet noise.

She wakes to his arms coiled around her waist and his face pressed to her chest, like a needy babe. Smiling, she places a sweet kiss to his mussed hair and buries further into his warmth.

"Thank you," she whispers, and he stirs. "Thank you for everything."

"No need to thank me," he grumbles, voice thick with sleep.

"I do," she refutes. "You have given me so much and I know that—" there's the hitch, throat choked and coated with tears. "That without you I would be lost."

"Geez," he hums and allows her to nuzzle a pink-tipped nose into his neck. "You pregnant again? You're never this moody."

The laugh he pushed for trickles through the tears. "I hope not. I don't even think my uterus is over Iggy."

His hands are gentle as they stroke the length of her spine, trace the stretch marks his children wove into her skin with their fluttering kicks and tiny fists. His actions speak thousands of words, touch soothing the ache in her heart at the thought of a life without him.

 _._

 _if you must speak_

 _speak every word as though it were unique_

 _._

Their children scream when they walk through Mira's door, surprised and so, so ecstatic.

"Mummy, daddy!" Layla screams as she launches into her father's arms, and Iggy crawls lightning-fast towards them. Lucy scoops him up and nuzzles against his soft cheek, heart clenching at his giggle.

It is perfect, oh-so perfect. But the seasons still turn and they fade, so fast that their little family can barely keep pace.

Garnet-choked throat, spitting teeth and apologies.

A ring rivalry that spilt into the streets, gangs and guns, such violence she selfishly never thought possible in her little world comprised only of her and him.

Nurses scramble from her path as she lays waste to the hall in her frenzy, Natsu so cold and alone in the ER of this miserable hospital in this backwater town. He still smiles when he sees her, right eye fused shut and purple blossoming along his jaw. His lips have split, dried blood mixing with the new as he hushes her. Seeing him makes her weep guiltily, as it should be her doing the comforting. He shouldn't be the one whispering through a mouthful of gauze, awkwardly stroking her hair with bandaged hands.

They remain like that until the doctor comes. The scans reveal a chest full of bullet fragments, dancing around like lethal butterflies which must remain because this stupid hospital has no surgeon willing to take the procedure. They are air lifted to one who will three hours away, and she is thankful for the sedatives keeping his travel sickness at bay.

Overly bright waiting rooms, dim smiles. This hospital threatens her sanity so much more than the last because it crawls with darkness and death, and it plays on the edge of her mind. Layla and Iggy chase some of it away but still, it remains, heavy on her heart like the short life of her unborn child.

Gray settles a heavy hand on her shoulder. "He's too stubborn to be done in by something like this. He'll be okay."

"I know," she chokes, and her mind flashes with ruby and steam and her own screams. "It's just—" _I'm scared of death_. She tightens her arms around herself in a bid to keep in all the things left unsaid.

Hours later the doctor emerges looking worse for wear but smiling nonetheless. "He's completely fine. The sedatives will take some time to wear off, but he is allowed visitors."

She runs to his room and cries out at what she sees. A bloody, beaten Natsu, so still and quiet. She wouldn't believe it was him if it weren't for the set of his brow, the arch of his nose. The next morning he promises it won't happen again, but she still wants to irrationally encase him in bubble wrap. They compromise: he'll stay out of the ring for while he heals, and she will not push for more.

"I thought I'd lose you," she confesses several nights later, bundled beneath their blankets in their home.

Natsu tugs her forwards and forces her gaze on his. "What do you see?"

"What?'

"What do you see?"

"You," she says. "What else would I see?"

"Look deeper."

And she does, flicks her gaze over every crevice of his face. His black eye, bruised and swollen jaw, split lips, concentrated frown, stitched brow, his fathomless gaze.

His determination.

His humanity.

His son's playful grin, his daughter's chin.

The man she fell in love with, all his golden oaths and promises.

"You," she repeats and traces a steady hand over each and every one of his bruises.

"And the proof that I'm alive," he finishes.

 _._

 _if you must fight_

 _fight with yourself and your thought in the night_

 _._

They pass in such sweet, soft sorrow. By each other's sides, smiles omnipresent. The earth trembles as they shudder through their last breaths, morning dew collecting in the crevices of their wrinkled cheeks, age-spotted hands intertwined. They feed well the land and flowers will grow at their feet, their names a whispered memory in the wind through the trees. They rise again and again, ages passing between their eyes as they are young and anew. The sun beats down on their backs, grass swaying in the gentle breeze. Like them, the field is gold, bright and unfalteringly burning.

She opens her eyes and finds him there, youthful and grinning. He extends a hand and she grasps it in hers, blinks up at him rather owlishly.

"Come on," he beckons, and begins leading her through the reeds. She follows behind with a laugh, sprinting ahead of him to chase the last rays of the setting sun.

There is so much to say, but she knows none of it needs to be said. He knows all of it, every single one of her insecurities, every single _I love you_ she had whispered throughout their years.

"Thank you," she says instead, and seals them with a kiss. "I would never have lived any of this."

He lets her cling to him, strokes the hair falling wildly around her shoulders. His expression is almost stern as he pulls away from her slightly, so concentrated on whatever it is that his mind has set itself to do.

"Natsu?"

"It's okay," he hums, and grins so vicariously that all of their moments seem to flash before her eyes. "We'll be together forever from now on."

The words settle around them, curl at their feet, paint the sky with vivid lilac and rose. She smiles softly and takes his hand more firmly, pulls him towards the endless horizon.

"Then let's go!"

.

.

.

thank you again to every single person that has accompanied me through this incredible journey.

big things are coming soon, so watch this space.


End file.
